The Daily Evansville Journal

We arrived at Murfreesboro, according to promise, at 9 o'clock A. M., precisely, and being attired in a full suit of "butternut" with an old-fashioned sealskin cap, took a seat on the stand without any molestation whatever. Governor Harris appeared on the platform erected for that purpose, at half-past ten o'clock. He was welcomed by the crowd which numbered about one thousand persons. Most of the audience belonged to some military company, and the flags were variously inscribed: "Possum Hollow Guards," "Rutherford Jayhawkers," "Rattlesnake Invincibles," and the like expressive and euphonious titles. Gov. Harris wore a splendid suit of white linsey breeches a good deal worn, adorned with a patch of black cloth on the left knee, and another of red flannel in the rear, a vest of green-curtain calico flowered with pink, and a graceful butternut roundabout, the right sleeve being pieced out with blue linsey. A pair of cowhide shoes, without socks, leaving an interval of six inches between their tops and the hem of his pantaloons, completed his classic, graceful, and highly picturesque costume. After a series of bows he began:

Ladies and Gentlemen: In looking over this mighty assemblage, announced but a few days by the public press to convene at this place, my breast swells with emotion which can find no adequate expression in words. As well might I attempt to describe in an address the wild upheavings of a volcano, when the chained Titan rises from his long agony of three thousand years, and thrusts his hand of flame through the crater of Mount Etna, while Sicily trembles to its centre, as to essay on this occasion to do justice to the glorious enthusiasm in the cause of independence which now fires with noble rage the breasts of the Southern people. [Tremendous cheering, during which the Governor took a drink of "old Robertson" from a gourd bottle in the hands of Andrew Ewing.] We are going to recapture Tennessee and retake Nashville.

That's so! This sort of peregrination over hills and hollows isn't what I expected, it don't agree with my constitution, and by— I am not going to stand it! [Shout of "Bully for you, old fellow!"] I want to get back to that splendid Capital, and I am going to do it or burst my boiler! [Loud applause!]

What if I did take $2,000,000 of the School Fund? That's nothing. Many a man has stolen more than that and died respectable. I was out of funds and bound to have the money, and I've spent it, too, but I'll pay it back when I'm Governor of Tennessee— won't I Andy? [Yes, yes, you will, Isham!] My friend, Andy Ewing, says I will, and who knows better than he? Many is the toddy we have swallowed together, and often as we have walked the streets, mutually supporting each other, we have been forced to exclaim with the Psalmist, "United we stand, divided we fall!" [Tremendous applause, and another swig from the gourd.]

My enemies are always accusing me of making a "Midnight Treaty." Well, wasn't I your Governor, and wasn't I elected to protect your interests, and if I believed it was to your interest to make a treaty with Jeff. Davis, hadn't I a right to do it? Answer me that. [Shouts of "Yes! yes!" during which the Governor took another heavy pull at the gourd.]

Laze and gem'men, [hic,] Andy Johnson says I made secret treaty [hic] d-n Andy Johnson! I'll make as many se treaties as I want to! I'll make five hun'erd thousand. If anybody says I shan't make se'treaties I'll shoot him through the head. 'At right, Andy Ew- ing? "Ain't I con'st'utional? [Exactly so.] Andy Ewing says I'm right—who says Andy Ewing's a liar? [Hic.] Aay- body say it? [Cries of "No! no! no!"] Well, you'd better not say it, for I've got five Alabama regiments to settle you if you dare say it. I'm for free principles, free discussion, free stealing, free relig- ion, and free whisky! I'm ruining my constitution and health forever by ex- posure to the weather and lying out. Bill Stoke's jayhawkers keep me dodging like a didapper all the time. Last niglt I slept in a tobacco barn, the night before that in a sheep-pen, and three nights be- fore that among the hazel bushes. Your folks are grumbling about loosing a little forage. What's that, I'd like to know, to the loss of my salary, my position, my rank, my official importance, my wine parties and whisky? I used to be drunk all the time, and now I think I'm lucky if I ean press whisky enough to get drunk once a week. "My sufferings is intol- erable," as a great man once said. I want to see Nashville. I want to see her beer-shops, and groceries, and billiard rooms, and Forrest's faro-bank, and the race-track, and those jolly old cusses of the Methodist Publishing House, who offered to publish a Confederate Bible for me that hadn't the Ten Commandments in it.

They told me the Ten Commandments were played out, and behind the times. I want to see the stately palaces on the Square, looking like big houses, which had come out from Cincinnati on a bust, and then the little shops around them, which look like delegates that had come up from the country towns to pursuade them to settle and make themselves at home. [Another tremendous drink, which emptied the gourd.] Andy Ew- ing, you're a dog. You've been drink- ing [hic] out of my gourd! You're a d-d Lincolnite. Laze and gem'men, I'm for free religion! Lincolnites have locked up all my preachers in Nasville. and conshequently religion is all played out. It's awful to think [hic] Nashvill's got no religion. Feller-citizens, no place is worth a d-n unless it has the benefit of free religin [hic.] Let's go and give Nashville more religin!

[Just here a cloud of dust was seen in the distance, out of which a bare headed courier soon burst at full gallop, and dashing p to the crowd announced that Col. Stokes was approaching with ten thousand cavalry, all riding horses bigger than elephants. The militia turned over the benches and scattered in all directions; several young ladies, who sat on the platform represeuting the se- ceded States, in attempting to jump down got their calico hitched on some planks, and, with their dresses completely re- versed, swung back and forth in the air kicking and squalling. Cries of "Bill Stokes is coming!" "There's General Negley!" "That's Andy Johnson!" filled the woods in all directions. The last we saw of Governor Harris he was fighting with a big nigger for a sorrel mule, which he wanted to impress for the occasion.]